Shooting critique: (to continue on what Hungry Joe said) When shooting in a "constant" lighting environment (all indoors or all outdoors), turn off the "Automatic White Balance" and/or "Auto-Exposure" on the camcorder. Manually set the levels while pointing the camera across the gym at a wall without windows. This will maintain a near-constant exposure throughout the video making it more "seamless". Try to avoid pointing the camera directly at any windows because they will appear as pure white 'portals' though they won't wash-out the indoor action as badly were everything still "Auto" on the camera.

Camcorder critique: HD camcorders are VERY cheap now. Shooting in 16:9 will give you a LOT more visual 'space' in the resulting video. I usually recommend the Aiptek Action HD GVS (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B002AKKBWU/) to people to start with, if for no other reason than the 720p 60fps mode which makes action shots just... SMOOTH. For $140, it is hard to find a better HD camcorder for the money.

Style critique: I'm not a fan of the fly-away-blocks transitions (or anything that breaks up the content of the scene). They are too visually distracting and take away from the content. I like to stick to simple fades/pushes (for slower action) or cuts (for faster action). Ending with a fly-away-blocks transition to complete black (no action) can be dramatic though.

The diversity in the video is REALLY nice. Too often people make videos that show the same things from 10 different angles. The fact that you can fill nearly 4 minutes of video without repeating yourself says a lot about the diversity of your program and training methods.

Great looking place. I might have to make an excuse to get up there some weekend soon & check the place out. Maybe bring my daughter (she is 6, she's been training in BJJ for almost 2 years) and visit your place and the zoo in one trip. Good video. Well done.

Shooting critique: (to continue on what Hungry Joe said) When shooting in a "constant" lighting environment (all indoors or all outdoors), turn off the "Automatic White Balance" and/or "Auto-Exposure" on the camcorder. Manually set the levels while pointing the camera across the gym at a wall without windows. This will maintain a near-constant exposure throughout the video making it more "seamless". Try to avoid pointing the camera directly at any windows because they will appear as pure white 'portals' though they won't wash-out the indoor action as badly were everything still "Auto" on the camera.

Camcorder critique: HD camcorders are VERY cheap now. Shooting in 16:9 will give you a LOT more visual 'space' in the resulting video. I usually recommend the Aiptek Action HD GVS (http://www.amazon.com/dp/B002AKKBWU/) to people to start with, if for no other reason than the 720p 60fps mode which makes action shots just... SMOOTH. For $140, it is hard to find a better HD camcorder for the money.

Style critique: I'm not a fan of the fly-away-blocks transitions (or anything that breaks up the content of the scene). They are too visually distracting and take away from the content. I like to stick to simple fades/pushes (for slower action) or cuts (for faster action). Ending with a fly-away-blocks transition to complete black (no action) can be dramatic though.

The diversity in the video is REALLY nice. Too often people make videos that show the same things from 10 different angles. The fact that you can fill nearly 4 minutes of video without repeating yourself says a lot about the diversity of your program and training methods.